Detectives at Playtime
by Totopup
Summary: Sherlock was the pasty, no-friends outcast - John was the gentle, friend-surrounded nice kid. When Jim, the class bully, decides to pick on them... Playtime turns deadly.


John, being 6, didn't know what love was. Or friendship. Or hate. I mean, in his head, he hated girls. But not really. Well, he didn't _like _girls. They were all slimy and pink and horrible. Sherlock was much better.

"Can I play with you?" John asked Sherlock, approaching him at the side of the playground, bending over something.

"No." Sherlock answered simply.

"But we're playing mums and dads and we need a mum and no one else wants to play." John whined at him, then crinkled his face in disgust as Sherlock straightened up and showed John the snail on his finger.

"Ugh! Put it down, I'll tell!" John screamed.

Sherlock blew a raspberry at him and let the snail drop.

"I don't want to play mum and dads."

"But I do and you never play with me."

"I don't want to." Sherlock determinedly said, staying where he was.

"You've got to!" John stamped his foot and eventually Sherlock gave in, John dragging Sherlock by his arm over to a group of other people.

"Not him! He's weird!" Sally yelled, throwing a disgusted stare at Sherlock. Sherlock jumped out from behind John and glared.

"Well you're stupid!" he yelled back.

"I just want to play!" Greg yelled, and John stepped forward.

"I'm the dad." John announced.

"I want to be a teenager." Jamie said. "I'm a big boy."

"I'm a teenager too." Greg yelled.

"I want to be a baby!" Sally said, and screamed like she was three years old.

"Sherlock you have to be the mummy."

"I don't want to be a _girl!_" Sherlock exclaimed, looking at Sally.

"You have to be. I want to play now!" John said, and they all screamed and started running around, bumping into each other, going to the shops and designing imaginary bedrooms. This continued until they ran back into the classroom, red-faced and out of breath. Sherlock followed a few minutes later, a sulky expression on his face.

"Come on Sherlock, break's over now!" Mrs Hudson, their teacher, said as Sherlock sat down at his seat. Unfortunately he sat next to Jim. He was the class bully – and what better for a bully than a little pasty boy, with a strange family and an outcast?

"Alright _Sherly?" _Jim teased, sneering. Jim was also a lot bigger than all the other boys – he had been kept behind a few years.

"Go away." Sherlock said, turning his nose up and opening his book to do his spellings.

"No." Jim said. This wasn't actually put into effect, as Jim was silent for the most part of half an hour as he was concentrating hard at his spellings. Sherlock finished way before everyone else and sat back in his seat. He noticed John looking at him.

John looked away; just as Jim finished his spellings.

"Ooohh! Are you a poofter? My dad always tells me to beat them up. I think you're a poofter." Jim said.

"Do you know what a poofter is?" Sherlock stated, and Jim frowned.

"Um... No. But that's not the point! I'm gonna beat you up." Jim said proudly.

"No, you're not."

"Yes I am!"

"Sherlock, Jim, sshh!" Mrs Hudson said from the front, and Jim shut up.

All the other boys were playing football; Sherlock was sitting on the steps, hands supporting his head.

"Sherlock, why don't you play football?" John asked and sat down next to Sherlock.

"I don't want to."

"But everyone likes football."

"Girls don't."

"Apart from girls."

"You don't."

"How did you know that?"

"You're not playing."

"I don't want to."

"Then shh." Sherlock said nastily, and John felt slightly hurt. He had only wanted to talk to Sherlock.

"Why don't we play?"

"I don't want to."

"You have to! I promise we won't play mums and dads." John promised.

"Then what are we playing?" Sherlock turned to look at John.

"We can play... Detectives!" John exclaimed, and dragged Sherlock up, running off towards the side of the playground. Sherlock turned around and saw Jim looking at him from the football pitch. Sherlock wasn't afraid of him – his outside wasn't, at least. His inside was. He knew that.

"Look! There's a frog!" John yelled, immediately forgetting about a game. He crouched down, his long hair flopping down in front of his face, and gazed at it.

"It's just a frog. Father has loads of them at home. He experiments on them." Sherlock boasts, puffing out his chest.

"That's horrible! What does he do to them?" John says, shocked, and stands up with the frog gently cupped in his hands. There was a childish glint in his eyes.

"He feeds them strange things. Mycroft says it's important. But I never listen to Mycroft, though. He's horrible." Sherlock screwed up his face in disgust, and glanced over to where Mycroft was sitting on a bench, surrounded by his friends. They were laughing at something Mycroft had said.

"Yes, he is." John agreed.

Sherlock was slightly shocked. No-one else though Mycroft was horrible; they all thought he was lovely.

"Why?"

"He pushed Adam into the mud on Monday." John said. Sherlock liked Adam. He didn't look at Sherlock like he was an alien.

"And then he tried to be friends with Greg. Greg's _my _friend." John complained.

"He's my friend too. Sort-of." Sherlock said. He looked at John, in his muddy, baggy school jumper. Sherlock wore the blazer – Mycroft had made him. Mycroft thought the school jumpers were too untidy.

John opened his hand a fraction and peered at the frog inside, an amazed expression on his face.

"Look, Sherlock! Look at him." a smile crossed John's face. He was awed purely by the fact that the frog was alive, that is survived. He also thought it was beautiful; shimmering green with small flecks of black that could have been put there by a paintbrush.

"Oh look what's here, two of my favourite poofters!" Sherlock heard Jim yell. He sauntered over, eyeing up Sherlock and John.

"Go away!" John yelled bravely. Jim just smirked.

"What's that you've got there, John? In your hands?" Jim walked over and forced John's hands open, taking out the frog.

"That's disgusting!" Jim yelled, dropping it instantly. He then brought his foot down on top of the frog and squashed it. It made a small squelch and John whimpered.

"That's what'll happen to you, poofter!" Jim screeched, sneering at John.

"Leave him alone!" Sherlock said, trying not to be scared. Jim was just a bully.

"No." Jim said.

"I think you _will _leave them alone." Mycroft's smooth voice came from Sherlock's left. He let out a sigh of relief, and he felt his face burn – being saved by his horrible brother!


End file.
